A Will and a Way

obscure French novelists and appreciate small, esoteric plays. Most of them wouldn’t have known if Logan’s Run was a television show or a restaurant in SoHo.
    The fact that she had a sort of primitive desire for Michael wasonly a tempest in a teapot. Pandora smiled as she replaced the poker. She couldn’t deny she enjoyed a tempest now and again.
    When a small one erupted behind her, Pandora turned in disbelief. A little white dog with oversize feet scrambled into the room, slid on the Aubusson carpet and rammed smartly into a table. Barking madly, it rolled over twice, righted itself, then dashed at Pandora to leap halfheartedly and loll its tongue. Entertained, Pandora crouched down and was rewarded when the puppy sprang onto her lap and licked her face.
    “Where’d you come from?” Laughing, and defending herself as best she could, Pandora found the card attached to the red bow around the puppy’s neck. It read:
    My name is Bruno. I’m a mean, ugly dog looking for a lady to defend.
    “Bruno, huh?” Laughing again, Pandora stroked his unfortunately long ears. “How mean are you?” she asked as he contented himself with licking her chin.
    “He especially likes to attack discontented relatives,” Michael announced as he wheeled in a tray carrying an ice bucket and champagne. “He’s been trained to go after anyone wearing a Brooks Brothers suit.”
    “We might add Italian loafers.”
    “That’s next.”
    Moved, incredibly moved, she concentrated on the puppy. She hadn’t the least idea how to thank Michael without making a fool of herself. “He isn’t really ugly,” she murmured.
    “They promised me he would be.”
    “They?” She buried her face in the puppy’s fur a moment. “Where did you get him?”
    “Pound.” Watching her, Michael ripped the foil from the champagne. “When we went into town for supplies last week and I deserted you in the supermarket.”
    “And I thought you’d gone off somewhere to buy pornographic magazines.”
    “My reputation precedes me,” he said half to himself. “In any case, I went to the pound and walked through the kennels. Bruno bit another dog on the—on a sensitive area in order to get to the bars first. Then he grinned at me with absolutely no dignity. I knew he was the one.”
    The cork came out with a bang and champagne sprayed up and dripped onto the floor. Bruno scrambled out of Pandora’s lap and greedily licked it up. “Perhaps his manners are lacking a bit,” Pandora observed. “But his taste is first class.” She rose, but waited until Michael had poured two glasses. “It was a lovely thing to do, dammit.”
    He grinned and handed her a glass. “You’re welcome.”
    “It’s easier for me when you’re rude and intolerable.”
    “I do the best I can.” He touched his glass to hers.
    “When you’re sweet, it’s harder for me to stop myself from doing something foolish.”
    He started to lift his glass, then stopped. “Such as?”
    “Such as.” Pandora set down her champagne, then took Michael’s and set it on the table as well. Watching him, only him, she put her arms around his neck. Very slowly—unwiseacts done slowly often take on a wisdom of their own—she touched her mouth to his.
    It was, as she’d known it would be, warm and waiting. His hands came to her shoulders, holding her without pressure. Perhaps they’d both come to understand that pressure would never hold her. When she softened, when she gave, she gave through her own volition, not through seduction, not through demand. So it was Pandora who moved closer, Pandora who pressed body to body, offering hints of intimacy with no submission.
    It wasn’t submission he wanted. It wasn’t submission he looked for, though it was often given to him. He didn’t look for matching strength, but strength that meshed. In Pandora, where he’d never thought to search for it, he found it. Her scent twisted around him, heightening emotions her taste had just begun to stir. Under his hands, her body was firm with the underlying softness women could exploit or be exploited by. He thought she’d do neither, but would simply be. By being alone, she drew him in.
    She didn’t resist his touch, not when his hands slipped down to her hips or skimmed up again. It seemed he’d done so before, though only in dreams she’d refused to acknowledge. If this was the time for acceptance, she’d accept. If this was the time for pleasure, she’d take it. If she found both with